So who stands to win and who has the most to lose from BCE Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc.’s takeover of the Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment empire?

So who stands to win and who has the most to lose from BCE Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc.’s takeover of the Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment empire?

A clear beneficiary is Toronto construction magnate Larry Tanenbaum, whose MLSE holding jumps by nearly 5 per cent essentially for not standing in the way of the $1.32 billion deal that will see rivals Bell and Rogers assume a combined 75 stake in Maple Leaf Sports.

And there is the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, which will turn a tidy profit of more than $1 billion on the sale of an MLSE holding it began assembling in the early part of the last decade.

The winners

Tanenbaum will see his 20.47 share of MLSE grow to 25 per cent, will remain MLSE chair and will retain right of approval on any sale or changes to the ownership arrangement, along with holding onto a significant say in the division of broadcast and Internet assets.

“Tanebaum has a lot of influence,” said Friends of Canadian Broadcasting spokesman Ian Morrison, who added that the BCE/Rogers partnership is bound to create disagreements that Tanenbaum will be called on the arbitrate

While Teachers’ will forego future revenue from the profitable MLSE, the fund lacks distribution channels needed to maximize the potential of the asset in this digital age, observers said. Teachers’ also gets a cash infusion as it faces mounting pension obligations to its retired teachers.

Fans of MLSE teams the Leafs, the NBA’s Raptors, the American Hockey League’s Marlies and pro soccer’s Toronto FC could be both winners and losers with many bloggers lamenting the fact that a deep-pocketed, sports obsessed industrialist who is not Research In Motion co-chief executive Jim Balsillie couldn’t have stepped up.

The bloggers also expressed fears that the Rogers and Bell commitment to MLSE could preclude more spending for the Rogers-owned Blue Jays Major League Baseball team. There is also online speculation that any potential Rogers bid for the NFL’s Buffalo Bills is well on the back burner. Fans of the Ottawa Senators NHL team, however, may be able to look forward to more content on the CBC.

Mobile content customers will win “massively,” sport media analysts said, noting that a profusion of new online sports apps and live sports is on tap for Bell and Rogers’s mobile customers.

BCE’s The Sports Network will probably get more games after the deal and could gain regional rights while Rogers’ Sportsnet may also air more content, through existing licensing deals have some time before they run out.

People who enjoy sports streamed live onto mobile devices stand to win, but the likelihood of data plan cost hikes and more games on pay per view ramps up with a concentration of ownership that will require antitrust approval.

A Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment spokeswoman said it is too early to gauge the impact of the deal on the company’s 700 full-time employees or its Leafs and Raptors pay TV offerings. Leafs TV, in particular could become home to more regional games after deals with Sportsnet expire.

BCE and Rogers say they expect shareholders to benefit from the deal even though shares in both companies were little changed on Friday. Ken Wong, a business professor at Queen’s University, however, said the market is digesting the impact of a transaction that he said will create new revenue streams for both companies and assure a surge in licensing fees for content that regulators say must be made available to rivals at market rates.

For BCE and Rogers, the purchase is strategically positive as it means the telecom giants will control coveted sports content, said Maher Yaghi, an analyst at Desjardins Securities.

The rough split of control of the assets is also a defensive move in that it will block Rogers and BCE from outright ownership, he added in a note to clients.

With Rogers and Bell each acquiring a 37.5 per cent equity interest, he said splitting the cost of ownership also lowers the risk of the acquisition.

The losers

Speculation has Rogers’ Sportsnet radio’s the Fan590 and Bell Media controlled TSN 1050 sharing Maple Leafs radio rights starting next year, which would put the Corus AM640 Leaf broadcast on the sidelines — while the Real Sports cable channel could also come under pressure.

The CBC may emerge as a loser even though the deal will keep MLSE ownership in Canadian hands. Observers say the CBC might be outbid by combined BCE/Rogers when its deal with the NHL expires after the 2013–2014 season. Morrison, however, said CBC could be outbid even without the MLSE deal, adding that Bell Media’s CTV network might be reluctant to disrupt its programming to the extent that NHL hockey broadcasting requires.

A spokesman for the CBC, meanwhile, said it’s too early to tell what will happen to CBC’s NHL rights, noting as well that the public broadcaster is involved in ongoing content partnerships with both BCE and Rogers.

The players and their unions. Both the NHLPA and the NBAPA have revenue-sharing deals with the NHL and NBA, respectively. With Rogers and Bell in cahoots, that means almost no chance of expensive bidding wars to drive up the broadcast rights fees.

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